So I had a few seconds this morning to check out Jason Rose’s website.. (actually I didn’t have the time but I took it anyway 🙂 I was so jealous looking at the picture of him under spinnaker sailing that I decided to inflict it on everyone else. 🙂
Also I noticed a picture of his dodger he was commenting on and it struck a note with me as I am currently in the midst of building the top for my new Hard Dodger. It is huge and we love it but it is huge.. I am thinking I might have gone way overboard on the size. Here is a picture of Jasons. I’m not sure it is the final version as his comments seemed to indicate that there had been a few versions. Maybe we can talk him into doing a write up with the full progression of what he has tried. Anyway here is a picture from his site of one of the dodgers he has tried and soon I will have a full write up on building ours with pictures.
Bill Ampt just sent in some before and after pictures of the recent paint job on Saffanah, his DE32. She is looking really nice Bill. I think Valkyr is going to be giving me a talking to about her new paint job that was supposed to be done a year ago. 🙂
Here is the pictures with commentary by Bill.
I thought I would send a couple of before and after pictures of Saffanah as we progress through the retrofit we have been performing for the past two years.
In addition to all of the mechanical and sail handling changes we have made, we recently repainted Saffanah changing her color scheme from maroon and white to black, gold and white
I have sent several posts on the various changes we have made so I will not elaborate – just thought I would let the pictures do the talking about Saffanah’s new cloths.
One of the photos shows the dinghy hanging from the davits we installed to work with our Airies Windvane and which hopefully all can deduce which photos are before and which photos are the afters
Over the years Saffanah’s hull had been badly scratched and gouged from a argument with a mangrove island somewhere in the Keys. So the effort to fair the hull and remove some previous paint jobs took some time. Rather than roll and tip once the hull was patched and primed we hired a professional to apply the final coats of Awlgrip
Here is Pee Wee, the dinghy, hanging happily above Betty, the Aires Windvane.
Last weekend we decided to inspect our under-the-water hull. We had prepared for weeks, and found a spot where the tide would leave us high and dry for a few hours. Even better, it was right around the corner from our “normal” slip. In the middle of the night, we snuck away and motored down the long, narrow piece of water between two wharves, finally meeting a seawall, which we tied up to. I put one piling near the mast and let the others fall where they might, hanging a fender on the two that touched our hull. We set our spring lines and secured our baby with care and waited for the tide to drop. I set my alarm for four hours later. When it rang, I hopped out of my pilot berth to see what the tide was doing. Once on deck, I tied a line from our mast to the piling and cinched it tight, helping us lean into the pier. Over the next ten minutes, I stood on our cap-rail, ultimately stepping onto the land to check for movement. When finally there wasn’t any, I knew our keel was on the ground and we were beginning to stop floating. Hopefully, now I could rest.
My next alarm was set for two hours later, a.k.a. 6am. I barely caught a wink of sleep the entire night in anticipation of what might happen and what I might see. I would think of all possibilities, one being the entire hull is one blister, and many other extremes including nothing being wrong. Every time I would turn over in bed, I would think of something else. what if someone tried to steal my boat? We were right in the middle of a sketchy part of town. “How are they going […]
We purchased Saffanah with two purposes in mind. We needed a blue water sailboat small enough to be single handed while sailing the Atlantic circle, and secondly we wanted a beamy live-aboard, shallow draft boat that could motor the 1800 miles of European canals and rivers we wanted to explore. Further, we needed to stick to a tight budget that limited options, avoided purchasing stuff from a catalogue, and required us to do most of the work “for free”. A new Island Packet was out of the question.
So with the right price and a solid hull, a well worn and needy Saffanah became the hole in the water in which we have invested a bunch of money and few months of spare time. Some of the more substantial projects have included:
Reconstruction of the hull underbody including replacing the cutlass bearing, reworking the rudder post and brass bearing plates, replacing all through hulls, and completing a handful of hull bottom painting related projects. Overhaul of the 30 HP Perkins Parama diesel engine including injectors, water pump, exhaust Installation of pressure water, hot water and reverse cycle heating and a/c system Replacement of every hose on the boat – fuel, engine cooling and exhaust, fresh water, cockpit scupper drains, pressure water systems. Reconfiguration of the fuel tanks and installation of a continuous fuel filtration system. Replacement of all standing and running rigging including re-wiring the mast head navigational lights. Replacement of all sails and the addition of a cruising spinnaker, lazy jacks and Mackpak, and storm sails and the installation of new spreaders. Reconstruction of anchor platform, Sampson posts, bow sprit, windlass and the addition of various cleats and attachments to accommodate mooring anchors, sea anchors and drogues. (Also included the construction fender boards to protect Saffanah from lock […]
That’s right folks, time for the ol’ mast to come down. I have the crane reserved for tomorrow afternoon and am fully prepped for it to come down. I’ve been kind of shocked at the lack of resources online describing the preparation and process of unstepping a mast. Most of us need to pay the yard for the actual crane and its operation, but many of us need to save cash and not pay the yard for the de-rigging and such. Thanks to the guys on the Sailnet forums for helping me out in preparation (link).
Why am I taking the mast out? Plenty of reasons! I am replacing all of the standing rigging including chainplates, the mast needs to be re-painted, electronics need to be replaced and re-wired, most hardware will need replacing, replace the compression post beneath it, refurbish the bowsprit (possible replace if I find rot), and a few more projects I can’t think of right now. I also need the mast and rigging out so I can continue to get the decks and teak caprails completely bare for repair and painting. Hopefully getting it down will give me some good momentum.
Mast removal a success!
Tuesday afternoon came around and it was time for the mast to come off. The crane showed up and I had everything prepped for a quick removal. I told the yard that I didn’t need any help (i.e. pay them $$$) in preparation, but they took that as I didn’t need any help once the crane got there. Myself and the crane operator tried to give it a go, but once he realised I really didn’t know what I was doing he went to get the yard guys. They came and lent a hand, and the mast was off […]
If donating please state in the extra info field during the donation process if you do not want to be publicly credited for your donation on the forums donation page.
Or jump to Amazon from here to purchase stuff. This gives us a very small referral fee that costs you nothing when you actually purchase qualifying products on amazon.
Recent Comments